This invention relates to devices to aid in the laying of tile, and in particular, to a tile spacer.
When laying tile for a tile floor, it is desirable that the tiles be evenly spaced apart for the finished floor to be a quality installation and to look nice. It is very desirable, particularly for the professional tile contractor, to have available a device which will enable him to evenly space tiles while laying them. Such a device is time saving, labor saving and cost effective. Several tile spacers have heretofore been produced. For example, U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,930,135 and 3,010,213, both to Rodtz, St. and 4,793,068 to Golkar, show tile setting gauges for use between tiles. These spacers, however, have very short spacing members. Thus, using these spacers, it would be difficult to align the tiles so that the grout joint is even along the full length of the tile due to possible slipping or moving of the tile when setting the tile. Further, these spacers do not have an easily accessible handle, making their removal from between the tiles following the alignment difficult. The use of these spacers is further disadvantageous in that their removal can not occur until after the tile adhesive has completely hardened.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,254,417, to Carmichal, St. and 3,775,856 to Schmidt, show tile setting templates. As shown, these templates have rather limited use. They can only be used for a specific sized tiles and cannot be used in laying all the tile in a room. Due to the size of the template, it is difficult to use in small spaces when the room is nearly completed.
Lastly, U.S. Pat. No. 3,735,497, to Boettcher, shows a spacer which is used in laying floorboards. This is a short spacer, and thus would not facilitate the laying of the boards perpendicularly to each other. It therefore has the same drawbacks as does the Golkar and Rodtz tile spacers.